Chapter 5 - THE CONFESSION IN THE CELLAR
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The subterranean holding vaults beneath the Moretti mansion were cold, damp, and smelled of century-old limestone.
These were the rooms where Don Roberto Moretti had interrogated rivals during the violent syndicate wars of the 1990s.
Vanessa Bellini sat on a metal folding chair in the center of the concrete room, her ruined red silk gown soaked with tears and dirt.
Her wrists were bound behind her with heavy steel handcuffs.
Two armed Moretti guards stood like stone pillars by the reinforced iron doorway.
The heavy door swung open with a screech of ungreased hinges, and Dominic walked into the dim light.
He had removed his suit jacket and tie, his crisp white dress shirt unbuttoned at the collar and rolled up to his forearms.
The dark tattoos of black roses and dagger blades along his forearms were fully exposed.
He dragged a second metal chair across the concrete floor, the screech of metal making Vanessa flinch violently.
Dominic placed the chair three feet in front of her and sat down, leaning his elbows on his knees.
“Let’s talk about my father, Vanessa,” Dominic said, his tone conversational and bone-chillingly calm.
Vanessa lifted her swollen, tear-stained face, her vanity completely shattered.
“Dominic, I swear to God, your father planned everything!” she sobbed, her teeth chattering from the damp chill.
“He called my father six months before the baby was born.”
“He said the Moretti bloodline could not be diluted by a girl whose father worked as an auto mechanic on 47th Street.”
Dominic’s jaw remained locked, but his eyes grew colder with every word she spoke.
“And Dr. Harris?” Dominic asked.
“How much did your father pay him to sign the false death certificate?”
Vanessa swallowed hard, her eyes darting toward the concrete floor.
“Two hundred thousand,” she whispered.
“Half from your father’s slush fund, and half from my father’s shipping accounts in Panama.”
“And the car that ran Claire off the road three days before Noah was born?” Dominic continued, his voice dropping into a deadly whisper.
Vanessa froze, her breath catching in her throat.
I had never told Dominic about the black sedan that had clipped my bumper outside the grocery store.
He had figured it out on his own from the old police reports.
“Answer me, Vanessa,” Dominic said, leaning forward until his shadow swallowed her entirely.
“Did my father order that car, or did you?”
Vanessa burst into uncontrollable weeping, shaking her head frantically.
“I didn't want the baby to die! I just wanted her to deliver early so the doctor could take him!”
“I needed her out of Chicago before you came back from New York!”
“I knew that if you saw her holding your child, you would never look at me again!”
Dominic slowly stood up from the metal chair.
He looked down at the woman he was supposed to marry in seventy-two hours with absolute, pitiless disgust.
“You are a monster dressed in silk, Vanessa,” Dominic said softly.
“You tried to kill my son before he took his first breath.”
“You stole five years of my life, and you made the woman I love scrub floors in my own house.”
“Dominic, please!” Vanessa shrieked, falling forward off her chair onto the cold concrete.
“My father will give you whatever you want! Take our shipping lines! Take our southern docks!”
“Just let me leave the country!”
Dominic walked toward the heavy iron door without looking back at her.
“Your father doesn't own those shipping lines anymore, Vanessa,” Dominic said, his hand resting on the heavy latch.
“Marcus seized your father’s corporate headquarters thirty minutes ago.”
“Every bank account, every offshore trust, and every container ship registered to the Bellini name is now under federal asset forfeiture.”
Vanessa’s eyes widened in sheer, disbelieving horror.
“The feds?! You gave our records to the federal government?!”
Dominic turned his head, a cold, predatory smile touching his lips.
“I gave them your father’s records, Vanessa.”
“The Moretti family operates strictly in legal maritime logistics now.”
“You and your father will spend the next thirty years in a federal penitentiary for conspiracy, fraud, and racketeering.”
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“And every morning when you wake up in your cell, you will remember that you lost everything because you couldn't stand to see a four-year-old hold a wooden horse.”
He stepped out into the hallway and slammed the heavy iron door shut, sealing her into the darkness forever.
